Hull construction

ABSTRACT

Hull construction having an inlet port disposed at the lower part of the bow of a hull, an outlet port being opened in the stern or hull sides or both the stern and the hull sides thereof, and a watercourse interconnecting therebetween through the lower part of the bottom of the hull. An appropriate propelling means is arranged in the watercourse, and the inlet and outlet ports flare out toward the outside of the hull with adequate curve.

United States Patent 1 Odawara [1;] 3,841,258 Oct. 15, 1974 HULL CONSTRUCTION [76] Inventor: Chuich-iro Odawara, No. 49-1, Aza

Kami-ikarida, Oaza Naganawa'shiro, Hachinohe-shi, Aomori-ken, Japan [22] Filed: June28, 1972 21 Appl. NO.2 267,144

Woods 115/39 Deubelbeiss ll5/53 Doust 115/39 Primary Examiner-Albert J. Makay Assistant ExaminerDonald W. Underwood Attorney, Agent, or FirmSteinberg & Blake [57] ABSTRACT Hull construction having an inlet port disposed at the lower part of the bow of a hull, an outlet port being opened in the stem or hull sides or both the stern and the hull sides thereof, and a watercourse interconnecting therebetween through the lower part of the bottom of the hull. An appropriate propelling means is arranged in the watercourse, and the inlet and outlet ports flare out toward the outside of the hull-with adequate curve.

3-Clairns, 16 Drawing Figures PATENTED BUT I 51974 sum 10f 4 1 HULL CONSTRUCTION BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to the hull construction of various kinds of ships. One object of the present invention is to reduce the resistance of a hull as much as possible to increase navigation speed. Another important object of the present invention is to enhance the stability of a hull against waves.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING All the attached drawings show the embodiments of the present invention.

FIGS. 1 and 2 show the basic type of the hull construction according to the present invention.

More particularly, FIG. 1 indicates the lateral section of said hull construction.

FIG. 2 illustrates the plan view thereof.

FIGS. 3 to show the sectional views of the hull construction.

More especially, FIGS. 3 and 4 show the hull construction of a cargo ship.

FIG. 5 shows the hull construction of a passenger ship.

FIGS. 6 and 7 indicate modifications of the above basic type of hull construction respectively.

More specifically, FIG. 6 illustrates a plan view of an embodiment of the present invention for a tu'gboat,etc.

FIG. 7 indicates a plan view of an embodiment for a large ship-and the like.

FIG. 7A is a partly sectional elevation schematically illustrating part of the structure at the forward region of FIG. 7.

FIGS. 8 to 12 show an embodiment in which'the bow is constructed in multistage.

FIG. 8 shows a side view thereof.

FIG. 9 shows a plan view thereof.

FIG. 10 indicates an enlarged front view.

FIG. 11 is an enlarged side view of the bow.

FIG. 12 a sectional view of the bow on an enlarged scale. v v

FIGS. 13 to show various steerages of a ship having the hull construction shown in FIG. 7.

FIG. 13 shows how to lie a ship having the hull struction of this invention alongside a pier.

FIG. 14 shows how to steer such a ship to move obliquely.

FIG. 15 shows how to turn round such a ship.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION Conventional ships encounter comparatively great resistance, when the ships move forwardly. To reduce such resistance, the whole hull thereof was made streamlined with sharply pointed bows and stems. However, such modification of the shape of hull naturally has its own limitation. Moreover, since the hull became long because of the above modification of bull shape, the hulls must be of multistage. As a result, loading an unloading were very troublesome. The object of the present invention is to improve the above disadvantage to the utmost.

The outline of the embodiments of the present invention will be explained with reference to the attached drawings. The hull 1 has the watercourse 7 connecting the inlet port disposed at the lower part of the bow 2 to the outlet port 6 being opened in the stem 5 or the hull side 10 or the stern 5 and the hull side 10, wtth an appropriate propelling means (for example, screw propeller) 8 by which the direction of a jet can be changed by 180 degrees in the above watercourse. The sea water is taken in through the inlet port disposed in the lower part of the bow 2, and the taken-in sea water is accelerated by said propelling means 8 to be jetted out violently from the outlet port being opened in th stem 5 in order to propel the hull l-forward. The dirt removing net frame 19 is secured in front of the inlet port of the lower part of the bow 2 to prevent the suction of floating matter on the sea and to avoid the damage of the propelling means 8. The front 9 of the watercourse 7 is inclined upward at the bow 2, as shown by the solid line in FIG. 1.

The inlet port 3 flares with appropriate curve. On the other hand, the outlet port 6 also flares toward the stem 5 with adequate curve so as to decrease eddymaking resistance as much as possible with the aid of the streamlined ship side 10. In addition, because of the decrease of the contact area between the hull 1 and sea water and reduction of skin friction resistance owing to the upward inclination of the front 9 of the inlet port 3, the form resistance of the hull can be reduced and the hull l is pushed upward by lift as the ship goes ahead. I

As mentioned above, the hull construction according to the present invention'has the inlet port at the bow 2 to take in the sea water and the outlet port disposed at the stem 5 to jet out such sea water. Since the bow top of this hull construction points out in edge form, it is possible to make minimum bow wave caused by the sea water pushed out obliquely in forward direction as a ship goes ahead and stem wave caused by the swollen sea water gathered from surrounding sea to fill a vacancy produced at the stem when a ship goes ahead. Accordingly, compared with the hull construction of the conventional ships, the novel hull construction according to the present invention has far less wave making resistance.

Referring to the attached drawings, various embodiments of this invention will be explained. FIGS. 1 and 2 show an embodiment in which the watercourse 7 extends from the inlet port at the bow 2 to the outlet port 6 at the stern 5 throughthe lower part of the bottom 4. The steering gear 16a is mounted near the outlet port 6. The direction of going ahead is controlled by said steering gear 16a. In backing, by reversing the flow of the sea water in the watercourse 7 by reverse rotation of the propelling means 8, the direction of backing can be controlled by the operation of the front auxiliary steering gear 16b mounted near the inlet port 3. On the other hand, as shown in the sectional views in FIGS. 1 and 2, to facilitate the embarkment and disembarkment of passengers and loading and unloading of cargo from pier to a ship or vice versa, a swingable auxiliary landing plate 18 may be mounted at the stern, which has been already adopted by a ferryboat and the like.

FIGS. 3-5 respectively illustrate in transverse schematic sections the hull construction of different ships according to the invention, FIGS. 3 and 4 respectively illustrating the hull constructions of cargo ships while FIG. 5 illustrates the hull construction of a passenger ship.

On the other hand, FIG. 6 shows other embodiment very suitable for a tugboat to tug other ships and the likes. In other words, if the above hull construction is adopted for a tugboat, the jet of the sea water from the stem 5 of a tugboat causes great resistance by the reac-' tion of such jet against a ship to be tugged. Therefore, in the above embodiment for a tugboat, the sea water absorbed through the inlet port 3 is jetted out from the outlet ports 6 disposed on both sides of the hull relatively near the bow 2 through the watercourse. In addition, a front auxiliary steering gear 16b for backing is disposed in the watercourse 7, and at the same time, in the outlet ports 6 on both sides of the hull a jet controlling rudder 17 is mounted to close the outlet port completely or to regulate the passage and the direction of the jet. On going ahead and astern, the direction of movement of a tugboat is controlled by the adequate operation of the front auxiliary steering gear 16b and course 7 after accelerated by the propelling means 8' as much as possible, part of the sea water flow is jetted out through the outlet ports 6 disposed at hull sides 10 relatively near the bow 2.

The front auxiliary steering gear 16b is arranged near the inlet port 3, and the central auxiliary steering gear 16c and the front propelling means 8 are mounted behind the front auxiliary steering gear 16b, that is, at a position where the watercourse 7 branches in three ways. In FIG. 7 the drive engine and the shaft extending therefrom to the propeller 8' are situated over the central auxiliary steering gear 160. This arrangement is illustrated in FIG. 7A. On the other hand, the jet controlling steering 17 is disposed at the outlet ports on both sides of the hull 1. In addition, on both outsides of the outlet port at the stern 5, a pair of steering gear 16a are arranged to control the direction of the jetted out sea water. As may be seen from FIG. 7, the pair of rudders 16a are respectively situated at opposite sides of the outlet-l6 and are swung in unison, through suitable controls, in the manner illustrated in FIGS. 13-15 in order to contribute to the steering of the ship. A ship having such hull construction has a very marked advantage to facilitate its lateral movement (See FIG. 13), the oblique movement (see FIG. 14) and turning round movement (see FIG. 15).

Furthermore, referring to FIGS. 8 to 12, a large ship having the hull construction as an embodiment of the present invention, has a bow of multistage (two-stage in the drawings). To reduce bow wave caused by a second bow of greater width as much as possible, the partition plate 21 inclining at an adequate angle of elevation is mounted at th lower part of a first bow 11.

The auxiliary inlet port 13 is formed above the partition plate 21, having the auxiliary steering gear 16d and the adequate auxiliary propelling means 8" (in the drawings, a screw propeller is used) in the inner part thereof. The sea water is taken in through the first inlet port and is accelerated to jet it out from the auxiliary outlet port 22 opening on both sides in rear of the first bow 11 along the both pointed side walls 14 of the second how 12.

When the sea water is pushed forward obliquely by the both pointed side walls 14 of the second bow 12, as the ship goes ahead, such obliquely pushed out sea water flowed away with the straight jetted out sea water to the rear of the stern 5, to reduce the generation of the bow wave as well as resistance. The front auxiliary steering gear 16b is mounted below the partition plate 21. The propelling means 8 is mounted in the watercourse 7 extending longitudinally through the lower part of the bottom 4 to jet out the sea water from the stern S in the appropriate direction by the operation of the steering gear 16a in order to navigate a ship. Moreover, the jetted out sea water flow controlling rudder 17 is mounted at the above auxiliary outlet port 22 to control the amount of jetted out sea water and the direction thereof respectively to assist the oblique movement and turning of the hull 1.

Element 15 and 19 show the adequate engine and the float removing net frame respectively. The arrows of chain line and the solid line indicate the direction of the water flow and the direction of forward movement respectively.

As stated above, the hull construction according to the present invention has far less wave-making resistance and eddy making resistance as a ship goes ahead, compared with that of the conventional ships. Accordingly, the propelling speed of the ship can be increased astonishingly. In addition, owing to the hull construction of this invention, a ship with wider breadth and shallow draft can be built, so loading and unloading of cargo can be facilitated to the utmost.

The hull construction according to the present invention can enjoy especially high stability against waves. Further the side of a ship can be completed simply by welding desired number of iron plates which were already welded together to a desired length in longitudinal direction by electric welding. For this reason, the number of welding places can be extremely reduced, so the ship building cost can be greatly reduced and the navigation speed can be further increased owing to the light weight of the hull.

I claim:

1. In a ship, an elongated hull having a lower region formed with a watercourse extending longitudinally through said hull from a front bow region to a rear stern region of said hull, said watercourse being situated centrally of said hull, propeller means situated in said watercourse adjacent said stern end of said hull for propelling water through said watercourse and driving the water out of the latter at the stem end of the hull, steering means carried by said hull at the stem end of said watercourse for at least partly contributing to the steering of the ship in response to issue of water out of said watercourse at the stern end of said hull, and said hull having at the front end of said watercourse an upwardly directed front wall portion which extends forwardly and upwardly from said watercourse at the bow region of the ship for contributing to lift of the ship during forward travel thereof, said front upwardly directed portion of the hull at the front end of said watercourse forming a partition, said hull being formed with a second watercourse above said partition extending rearwardly from the bow of the hull only partly longitudinally along the same and branching outwardly to opposite sides of the hull for directing water through the upper watercourse and outwardly toward the opposite sides of the hull, a second propeller means situated in the second watercourse centrally of the hull for drawing water in through the second watercourse and impelling the water toward the opposite sides of the hull, and a pair of rudders respectively situated at regions of opposed outlets of the second watercourse at the opposite sides of the hull for controlling the flow of water toward the sides of the hull at the upper watercourse. 

1. In a ship, an elongated hull having a lower region formed with a watercourse extending longitudinally through said hull from a front bow region to a rear stern region of said hull, said watercourse being situated centrally of said hull, propeller means situated in said watercourse adjacent said stern end of said hull for propelling water through said watercourse and driving the water out of the latter at the stern end of the hull, steering means carried by said hull at the stern end of said watercourse for at least partly contributing to the steering of the ship in response to issue of water out of said watercourse at the stern end of said hull, and said hull having at the front end of said watercourse an upwardly directed front wall portion which extends forwardly and upwardly from said watercourse at the bow region of the ship for contributing to lift of the ship during forward travel thereof, said front upwardly directed portion of the hull at the front end of said watercourse forming a partition, said hull being formed with a second watercourse above said partition extending rearwardly from the bow of the hull only partly longitudinally along the same and branching outwardly to opposite sides of the hull for directing water through the upper watercourse and outwardly toward the opposite sides of the hull, a second propeller means situated in the second watercourse centrally of the hull for drawing water in through the second watercourse and impelling the water toward the opposite sides of the hull, and a pair of rudders respectively situated at regions of opposed outlets of the second watercourse at the opposite sides of the hull for controlling the flow of water toward the sides of the hull at the upper watercourse.
 2. The combination of claim 1 and wherein said steering means is in the form of a single rudder situated in line with a central longitudinal axis of said watercourse at the stern end of the hull.
 3. The combination of claim 1 and wherein a front steering means is situated at the region of the front end of the watercourse for contributing also to steering of the ship. 